Wednesday, March 30

Yesterday I went to the post office to pick up the mail and got a wonderful surprise!

A big box of fabric. Who wouldn't love that.

I did a logo for a fellow quilter and we'd agreed that my payment

would be fabric. This was a wonderful surprise to get so much.

There was also 2 great books in the box of goodies of Japanese Quilts.

All of the fabrics are beautiful and some are designs I'd never

have picked out for myself and I love them all.

At the quilting social yesterday I learned 2 new things. One was to take a 20lb bag of bird seed and turn it into a huge tote. It's for my sister to take on her treasure hunting trips to the flea market. The other thing was I learned how to make a french seam pillow case. When reorganizing my sewing room I'd set aside fabric for pillow cases and this pig fabric was one of them. The brown trim - one of my favorite Moda grunge fabrics. (I have this in about 5 different colors - love it)

So today I'll start my koi quilt. Think I finally have a design in mind.

Tuesday, March 29

Yesterday I finished the wall hanging I'd been working on and had just enough fabric and embellishments left over for a post card. That got me thinking... dangerous I know. I really need to make a post card or ATC from the left overs from every thing I make.

So I'll try to do this and hopefully get a little bit of extra done for my

Monday, March 28

Wow I was shocked when I opened my blog today and saw I'd not posted since last Wed...hum what happened? I've been busy thou working on reorganizing my play room. How does it become such a mess? I had my cutting table crammed into a corner and really needed room in there to roll it into the center when I'm basting a quilt. A lot of moving had to be done to get it to work but I've done all the big moving and I'm down to the finish line and just refolding fabric and putting that away.

My old paper/paint area.

Now it's paper/paint/fiber mixed media area.

I combined my art & fiber supplies.

There is even a small cheep machine under the table for those

scrungy jobs you don't want to put on your good machine (paper and such)

The old position for the cutting table.

This made it hard to reach the top shelf too.

Now I have room to roll the table out and open it all the way up in the middle of the room. When it's not being used I keep it folded down. I had gotten into the habit of using it as a work surface and kept piling "stuff" all over it. This forces me to be neat. Moving it to the window is better too.

Sunday, March 20

My sweet MIL gave us this table and chairs a few weeks ago. I was thrilled. I'd wanted one for a good while but just never seemed to have the spare money for outdoor furniture. I wanted to make some pillows with some pop and found the perfect fabric on a day trip a few weeks ago at Sirs in Fayetteville. Got this great outdoor fabric for about $14. Picked up the pillow forms there too at a good price and figured each pillow cost about $12. One of the times when I came out cheeper to make them - like the old days.

Friday, March 18

This morning I took my coffee and some jewelry to photograph out on the deck and enjoyed this great weather. All too soon it will be too hot. I'm not of fan of 90 degree weather. 70's thou is just perfect. While I was taking photos I thought I'd share some more of my 70's jewelry. Yes, I did wear these. I now can hardly see the knots with my reading glasses. I must have had really good eye sight back then. I used the smallest thread, waxed linen, and cotton embroidery thread I could get my hands on. I'd spend days working on one little necklace. Tiny beads and sometimes a bit of wire, but it was mostly about the knots. I even made some rings and I found one of them in my mother's jewelry when we were going threw her things. She had kept it all those years.

Well back to present day and hammered metal - my new form of jewelry. Need to work on several new items for the Wire Workshop and a 2nd pair of earrings for the wire wrapped earring class tomorrow.

Thursday, March 17

I've worked on Klunker's ocean yesterday and today and I'm beginning to see some progress. It's been slow getting it to this point. I hate cutting out fabric with scissors and there was just no way around this. So I sat down and cut while watching TV. I drew out my pattern on freezer paper, cut out the shapes,then started trying to fit the puzzle back together.

Tuesday, March 15

I'm sure all of you will be able to relate to this. Last night I started reorganizing my sewing room. It just amazes me how messy it can get. This all started in an effort to clear out the pile of stuff I've allowed to collect under my cutting table. Way back when I could move my cutting table into the center of the room when I was pinning a top and it was so nice to be able to walk around it to cut / pin. Well somewhere alone the way it was pushed into a corner and "stuff" just started growing under it. First it was a basket of synthetics for my embellisher, then a basket of upholstery fabrics, then a big roll of batting. Well before I knew it the floor was covered. So last night after a yummy dinner I started on sorting. It always makes a huge mess - you know little piles of fabric everywhere. I ran across fabrics I'd bought years ago and looked at it wondering what had I planned for this? So I got out several tote bags and started sorting into those and before I knew it 3 good sized ones were full. So enough for the first night of reorg. With the trash can half full of very small bits that I made myself toss out and all the mini piles I though good start for today. What started this mess that will hopefully turn into a clean orderly room was when I went up yesterday morning to pick out the background fabrics for Klunker. His quilt background is clear in my mind and I wanted blue/green fabrics - it's so great when you have what you need in your stash.

When creative people get together - wonderful things happen. Saturday while at the Open House I was talking to Edna the quilt instructor and Becky a creative jewelry designer. We were talking about the beautiful Zen Tangle quilt Edna had made and that was when Becky came up with a fantastic idea. It's been buzzing around in my mind ever since and today it's getting started. I've never done a series of pieces, so this will be my first. It involves "Klunker". Born in a sea of zen tangles Klunker is going to come to life in the media he was born for - metal. I've printed out my pattern and will start cutting the metal today. I've never done anything like this and I'm so very excited. So as of now he's just a billion ideas running wild in my head. Will I quilt a free form sea for him. How about fabric paper? This will be an exciting mixed media piece and I'm off now to jump in head first.

Wednesday, March 9

Ahhhh such a zen moment when another page is completed for my Techniques 4 Textiles journal. I'd fallen a bit behind on this on going project. I do tend to get distracted with other little projects. I have been drawing zen tangles and zen doodles on paper and really enjoy it. For my journal page I wanted to use my machine as my pen and fabric as my paper. The quilting is pretty small, but it was fun. I get so lost I don't realize how long I've been buzzing away on such a small project till I look up at the clock. It is zen like to be sure. Now that I've taught myself how to sit properly I don't get back and shoulder pain when doing free motion. I still catch myself slumping, but sit right back up when I do, and keep my arms supported on the edge of the table. It's made all the difference in the world for my upper back.

So now what is next? Hum...I really need to get back on my Technique Journal, I'm several pages behind. But then there is all the new fabric I've gotten and it's laying over there on the shelf calling my name - can you hear it?

When I first started learning to do free motion I took large print fabrics and "traced" the patterns on them to teach myself to follow a line. This was much harder for me than just doing my regular stippling. It took me a while to get this down and "stay inside the lines". I continue to practice this but I've started using simple drawings I've done and I'm having a lot more fun with it. When one of my quilting buddies got me involved in drawing Zen Tangles/Doodles it open a new door for my drawing and I find these little drawings perfect for free motion - if simplified. So here is Klunker. He was named by Robbin in the Love Of Art Quilts group on Quilt With Us. I think his name is a perfect fit. First I drew him on fabric with a wash out pencil then got down to the fun of free motion sketching. I added the gray shading with a fabric felt tip. I've tested this marker and the color holds well after washing. It's a Y&C FabricMate. Oh and the pencil is by fonts & porter.

Sunday, March 6

Yesterday my sister and her husband and I went on a road trip to Fayetteville TN to go to Sirs Fabrics. I'd never been there before and it was sure worth the drive. The prices and selection were great and of course all the sights, even thou it rained non stop were wonderful.